Vol. 32, pp. 145-148 September 30, 1919 



PROCEEDINGS 



OF THE 



BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON 



A NEW ROCK IGUANA FROM PORTO RICO. 

 BY THOMAS BARBOUR. 



In 1917 Dr. G. M. Allen and Lieut. James Lee Peters visited 

 Porto Rico in the interest of the Museum of Comparative Zool- 

 ogy. They explored with great success a large cave near Ciales 

 and found in the floor, under an opening in the high domed roof, 

 a considerable number of both mammal and reptile bones. 



The latter have recently been sorted out and substantiate the 

 statement which I made some time ago (Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash., 

 30, 1917, p. 98) when 1 said that I believed Dr. Allen had found 

 jaws of Cyclura. In 1918 Miller (Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., 54, 

 1918, p. 509, pi. 81) named Cyclura mattea from shell heaps in 

 St. Thomas, — a species which proves to be very closely related 

 indeed to the form which I am about to name. It is perhaps 

 not remarkable that the Rock Iguana evidently became extinct 

 in Porto Rico at an early time. It was probably exterminated 

 by the considerable population of Porto Rican Indians before 

 the Conquest, because no tradition of its existence seems to 

 remain amongst either living inhabitants or in the literature. 

 The description of this species likewise fills the last consider- 

 able gap in the known distribution of the genus and confirms 

 the surmise ventured by Mr. Noble and myself that Rock 

 Iguanas had formerly been much more widely distributed than 

 their present dispersal would indicate. The limits of the range 

 of the genus coincided exactly with those of the Greater Antil- 

 lean subregion, including the Bahaman province and thus the 

 distribution of the genus becomes at once more suggestive as it 

 becomes more completely definable. 



29— Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash., Vol. 32, 1919. (145) 



